Photos of the Week - The Great Wall From Jinshanling to Simatai

On July 1st in Beijing, Qian, a group of five friends, and I went to a section of the Great Wall a few hours north of Beijing. The section is a hike from 金山岭 (Jinshanling) to 司马台 (Simatai). It is widely known as the best, relatively-accessible, section of the Wall.

This trip was my fourth trip to the Great Wall. I went by myself in 2006, with my friend Meaghan in 2007, and my family, again, in 2007.

It's been great every time.

Here are my most recent photos:


The Wall and its forts go on and on


There were two quick rain showers while we were out there. I thought they were great. They cooled us down, cleaned the air and kept the sky immaculately blue, and also provided this ridiculous rainbow. It was the closest full rainbow I've ever seen. I couldn't take a picture of the whole arc. Quite the setting!


The 10km hike had some difficult patches


A few of my friends walking through the terraced fort


Another steep section


I'll be honest with you, I had an urge to go try to push this little wall over. I, of course, didn't. It just looked like it was about to fall at any moment!


This is the Simatai section at the end. We didn't hike this part. It looked incredibly grueling.


A look back at the Wall after we'd finished


Me and Qian. On my chance to endorse something with my clothing for my Great Wall pictures, I chose to wear my hapless Kansas City Royals hat.


Qian felt this was a nice setting to make a yoga pose